South West governors have decided to beef up security around farms in the region by forming specialised units within the Western Nigeria Security Network, codenamed Amotekun.
The decision was reached at a roundtable on food security, organised by the Development Agenda for Western Nigeria, DAWN, Commission, on Wednesday, in Ibadan.
Vanguard gathered that the move is to address the acute food scarcity in the zone which was occasioned by pervasive insecurity in most parts of the zone.
Recall that the Southwest Governors’ Forum had directed the Commission to convene the meeting with the responsibility of fashioning out a regional agricultural template.
Though all the six governors were represented by their Commissioners for Agriculture, it was resolved at the meeting that all the resolutions would be meticulously implemented.
The five Commissioners for Agriculture who stood in for their governors include Mr Ebenezer Boluwade (Ekiti), Bolu Owotomo (Ogun), while Olayato Aribo, Babatola Faseru and Olasunkanmi Olaleye represented Ondo, Osun, and Oyo states respectively.
Mr Emmanuel Audu, the Permanent Secretary of the Lagos State Ministry of Agriculture represented the state’s commissioner for Agriculture.
In his opening remarks, the Director General of the Commission, Dr Seye Oyeleye stressed that the insinuations that the region had lost its capacity to produce its food should be discarded calling on the participants “to come up with recommendations that state governors can easily implement” within the next few months.
Other resolutions reached at the meeting include massive land clearing, enhanced security, and large-scale production of short-term crops like maize, sweet potatoes, and vegetables. Other plans include revitalizing moribund dams for irrigation, improving mechanization across the value chain, adopting a cluster farming model, expanding input distribution, and establishing an electronic agriculture database.
